BS 

1515 



ttbe Wntversus ot Cbicaao 

FOUNDED BY JOHN D. ROCKEFELLER 



AN INTRODUCTION TO THE 
STUDY OF OBADIAH 



A DISSERTATION 

SUBMITTED TO THE FACULTY OF THE GRADUATE DIVINITY SCHOOL 

IN CANDIDACY FOR THE DEGREE OF 

DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY 

(department of old testament literature and interpretation) 



BY 
GEORGE A. PECKHAM 



CHICAGO 

THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO PRESS 

1910 




CopyrightN 



COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT 



Ube Uiniversup ot Cbicago 

FOUNDED BY JOHN D. ROCKEFELLER 



AN INTRODUCTION TO THE 
STUDY OF OBADIAH 



A DISSERTATION 

SUBMITTED TO THE FACULTY OF THE GRADUATE DIVINITY SCHOOL 

IN CANDIDACY FOR THE DEGREE OF 

DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY 

(department of old testament literature and interpretation) 



BY 
GEORGE A. PECKHAM 



CHICAGO 

THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO PRESS 

1910 



3^ 



$*i$ 



.-?+• 



Copyright 1910 By 
The University of Chicago 



Published February 1910 



Composed and Printed By 

The University of Chicago Press 

Chicago, Illinois, U. S. A. 



©CU259044 






MY WIFE 



AN INTRODUCTION TO THE STUDY OF OBADIAH 

Obadiah, the shortest of Old Testament books, offers for solution an 
unusual number of difficult problems. There has been, and still is, great 
diversity of opinion regarding the date of the oracle and the circumstances 
that occasioned it. Is the prophecy as we have it a unit ? If not, how 
is it to be divided ? Are vss. 1-7 a record of history, or a prediction, or a 
"prophetic estimate" of events that were just taking place at the time 
when the message was delivered ? Difficulties in syntax, lexicography, and 
history confront the student in almost every verse. 

At the beginning of our study we are met by the striking resemblance 
between Obad., vss. 1-9 and parts of Jer. 49 : 7-22. Obad., vss. 1-4 and 5, 6 
have so much in common with Jeremiah that there can be no thought of 
independent origin for the two pieces. Either Jeremiah borrowed from 
Obadiah or Obadiah from Jeremiah, or both must be indebted to an older 
common source, or both have been annotated and increased by the same 
hand. From a careful comparison of the two texts it appears that in 
Obadiah the arrangement of the verses is the logical one and that the 
prophecy as a whole is here in its more original form; but occasionally 
Jeremiah offers the better reading: for example, the superiority of Jer. 
49 : 9 over Obad., vs. 5 ; and Jer. 49 : 15& over Obad., vs. 26, is evident. The 
present form of vs. 2 of Obadiah is due to textual corruption and that of vs. 5 
to interpolation. But it is unnecessary to enter here upon an extended 
discussion of the relation of Obadiah to the parallel passage of Jeremiah, 
for an excellent presentation of the material may be found in the article 
on "Obadiah" by J. A. Selbie, in Hastings' Dictionary of the Bible. See 
also the Introductions of Kuenen, Driver, and Cornill. 

The position of many scholars, stated by Kuenen (Einleitung) , is that 
both have followed the same original, of which Jeremiah has made free use, 
while Obadiah has taken it over with very slight changes (Ewald, Wilde- 
boer, Briggs, Driver, J. A. Selbie, and others). Hitzig in supposing that 
Jeremiah served as a model for Obadiah has had few followers. Well- 
hausen, Nowack, and Marti, who, with Stade, Smend, and Schwally, 
consider the piece from Jeremiah to be a very late production, maintain 
that its author borrowed directly from our book which, according to their 
theory, has suffered corruptions and received additions after his use of it. 
The arguments offered for this position seem valid. 

This short book has passed through its full share of changes, which 



2 INTRODUCTION TO STUDY OF OBADIAH 

will be noticed below. For the possibilities in the way of displacement, 
transposition, interpolation, glosses, and corruption of text compare the 
M® of I Kings, chaps. 2-14, with the text of the LXX. To take a single 
example, between vss. 35 and 36 of chap. 2 there is found in the LXX a 
section which corresponds to 5:9, 10; 3:16; 5:29; 9:24, 25, 23, 17, 18 of 
the MM. Every student of Old Testament textual criticism knows that 
many other passages would serve equally well for illustration. 

Before the appearance of Ewald's commentary, the unity of the book 
of Obadiah was generally accepted without question; although some saw 
that the last few verses had little to do with the rest of the prophecy, and 
gave them a purely messianic interpretation. Drusius, in his commentary 
(1594), says, on vs. 17, "What follows refers to the deliverance of the 
church and the reign of Christ," and Tarnovius in 1624 gives vss. 17-21 a 
spiritual application to the church and her enemies; but Ewald was the 
first to suggest that a prophet living in the exile had made use of an older 
oracle as the foundation of his own message of comfort to his people. 
According to Ewald, more than half of the present piece, vss. 1-10, 15-18, 
in subject-matter, language, and style, points to one or more older prophets. 
Little if any change has been made in vss. 1-10. It is not certain, how- 
ever, that vss. 15-18 constituted a part of this older oracle against Edom: 
in them our prophet may have used more than one source. Vss. 11-14 
and 19-21 are his own composition, dating soon after the capture of Jerusa- 
lem by the Chaldaeans. The historical background may be seen in a 
corrected reading of II Kings 16:6 and in Obad., vs. 7. Rezin has con- 
quered the territory east of the Jordan down to Elath, expelling the Jews 
and restoring the city to the Edomites. The latter, however, are obliged 
to tolerate the rule of their Aramean allies, which leads to bloody quarrels 
between them and their friends and protectors, so that many of the most 
distinguished Edomites are banished from the country. This furnishes 
Obadiah, a contemporary prophet in Jerusalem, an occasion for pro- 
nouncing Yahweh's judgment upon the pride of Edom {History of Israel, 
English transl., Vol. II, pp. 159 f.). 

Ewald's treatment, dividing the prophecy into an older and a younger 
portion, was a distinct advance, pointing the way to the solution of many 
difficulties in the Book of Obadiah. He has been closely followed by 
Kuenen, who is not so definite in the date of the older piece, and who has 
with slight variation from Ewald's position fixed the point of division at the 
end of vs. 9, and the date of the younger prophet some time after the return 
from the captivity in 536. In substantial agreement with him are Cornill, 
Wildeboer, Driver, Selbie in Hastings' Dictionary of the Bible, and others. 



INTRODUCTION TO STUDY OF OBADIAH 3 

Koenig (Einleitung) differs somewhat from Kuenen, inasmuch as he con- 
siders 1 6a, 18, 19a, 20b parts of the pre-exilic piece. 

The principal reasons offered for the partition are: (1) The enemies 
of Edom in vss. 1-9 are the nations who are aroused by Yahweh to execute 
vengeance upon their former friend and ally, whereas according to vss. 
15 ff., the judgment proceeds from Yahweh, and Israel is the instrument 
for its execution. (2) Vss. 1-9 represent Edom's chief sin as his pride and 
defiance of Yahweh himself because of reliance upon his stronghold, while 
in the latter part oi the book the punishment is visited solely because of 
his treacherous conduct against his brother nation, Judah. (3) The 
literary style of the two parts is entirely different. The first, abounding in 
striking figures, rich in thought, and concise in statement, is full of life 
and action; but the second, in marked contrast, is lacking in ideas, as well 
as vigor of expression. 

Wellhausen made a valuable contribution to the solution of the problem, 
when he established the main division in vs. 15. Vss. 6, 7^-9, 12, he 
considers as secondary, and sees the occasion for the remainder of vss. 
1-14, 156 in the driving of the Edomites out of their home by the Arabian 
tribes of the south some time after the first half of the fifth century b. c. 
Vss. i$a, 16-21 were added at a still later date not definitely fixed. Well- 
hausen's position has been accepted by the commentators, Nowack and 
Marti, also by Cheyne in the Encyclopaedia Biblica. In vss. 1-7 Well- 
hausen and Nowack see not prediction, but a record of past events; while 
Marti thinks of history in the making, "a prophetic estimate of Edom's 
conquest being enacted in the present." G. A. Smith grants Wellhausen's 
claim that the seventh verse of Obadiah refers to the expulsion of the 
Edomites by the Arabs in the sixth or fifth century b. c, but maintains the 
pre-exilic origin of vss. 1-6. "Vss. 8-9 form a difficulty," because they 
return to the future tense. Smith sees no difficulty in the way of dating 
the remainder of the book in the years following the destruction of Jerusa- 
lem, and thinks it not improbable that the prophet was an eye-witness of 
that awful time. Among those who have followed Ewald's lead in divid- 
ing the book into an older and a younger portion, but who have proposed 
decidedly unique treatments, may be mentioned Winckler, Altorientalische 
Forschungen, zweite Reihe, Band III (1900), pp. 425-57, and Sievers. 
Winckler brings the older piece, which consists of vss. 1-18, with the 
exception of the last clause of vss. 11, 13, 17&, into connection with an 
unsuccessful revolt of Jerusalem under Darius, at which time he supposes 
that Jerusalem was destroyed by the Edomites, Moabites, and Ammonites, 
under orders from the Persian king as a punishment for participation in 



4 INTRODUCTION TO STUDY OF OBADIAH 

the Ionic uprising about 500 b. c. But this destruction of Jerusalem at 
the hands of the Edomites is purely imaginary, and, as Marti says, is nothing 
but mere conjecture. 

Sievers in his "Alttestamentliche Miscellen," No. 7, published in 
Berichte ueber die Verhandlungen der Koeniglich-Saechsischen Gesellschaft 
der Wissenschaften zu Leipzig: Philologisch-historische Klasse, Band XXIX 
(1907), gives the Book of Obadiah a peculiar and original treatment based 
upon his theory that all the poetry of the Old Testament is written in the 
anapestic meter. He divides the material into four sections: I: ^bc, 4, 
$da, 2, 3a, 6, 7; II: ibca, 10a, 11-14, i$b; III: 16-18; IV: 19-21. I 
consists of pentapodies; II is made up of heptapodies; III is a series of 
four heptapodies, each, with the exception of the last, followed by a tripody; 
while IV contains heptapodies only. In addition to the changes noted 
above, he removes a few glosses from the text, and makes some other minor 
alterations which it is not necessary to notice here; but his proposition to 
drop the bfc$ from each of the eight prohibitions in vss. 12-14, and unite 
the conjunction with the verb as a u>aw-conjunctive is in opposition to all 
principles of sober criticism. Our present text could never have arisen 
from the reading which he proposes. It is true that dittographies and 
other mistakes in copying sometimes occasion trouble; but here we are 
asked to believe that something of the kind has happened in each of eight 
consecutive clauses, and the same thing in every case, changing a very easy 
reading into one of such difficulty that it has given commentators no end of 
trouble. The removing of $a to the beginning of vs. 6 is a change for the 
worse; for the clause does not fit well into its new context, whereas in its 
present position in the iU© it gives peculiar force to the poet's thought that 
Edom's pride of heart is caused by his inaccessible habitation. An equally 
serious objection to the change is that it leaves the participles of the 
remainder of the verse hanging in the air without a subject. Furthermore, 
Sievers in his effort to give each line the requisite number of feet some- 
times works havoc with the parallelism, which is generally recognized as 
one of the characteristic features of Hebrew poetry, as may be seen from 
his arrangement of vss. 12-14: 1 
And you gloated over your brother in the day of his adversity, and rejoiced over 

the sons of Judah 

1 In Hebrew his lines run: 

rrnm *»b rnsrcrn 1-03 riva vnan *nm 

■»£y nrtDn 8ihm Ts b^m rihna tira 

i-pb dtq inmn rins m anm ri-ns rira 

■wbs nx rfnarh p^ttn by ■torn ibTQ<i-p n»>nbwi 

- * * - * * - * * rra nvn VH"nis "foom 



INTRODUCTION TO STUDY OF OBADIAH 5 

In the day of their destruction and uttered proud words and entered the gate of 

my people 
In the day of their calamity, and you gloated, even you, over his injury in the 

day of his calamity, 
And you put forth your hand upon his wealth, and you stood upon the crossway 

to cut off his fugitives, 
And you delivered up his survivors in the day of distress, .... 

He has dropped "in the day of his distress" 1 at the end of vs. 12, and 
"in the day of his calamity" 2 from the close of vs. 13, and has a gap of 
three feet at the end of vs. 14, although the section does not close with 
that verse. If these heptapodies which ignore the parallelism for the sake 
of the meter are contrasted with the perfect parallelisms of the qinah- 
verses offered in the lines of the Massorites, it is easy to see that the arrange- 
ment of Sievers is not that of the prophet. In the HIST emphasis is put 
upon "the day of his calamity," or "distress," or "destruction" at the end 
of each line, with the exception of 14a, which is out of place here; but in 
the proposed grouping of feet all these fine touches of the poet are lost. His 
division, on metrical grounds, of vss. 16-21 into two sections, 16-18 and 
19-21, does not commend itself; for when the recognized glosses are 
removed and the text put in order, his whole scheme falls to the ground. 
We see no good reason for departing from the general view which regards 
the rest of the book from vs. 1 7 to the end, aside from explanatory glosses, 
as from one hand. Vs. 16 is no part of the original text, as we shall see 
below. 

Another thing which arouses suspicion that Sievers is doing violence to 
the language in the interest of a theory is the number of syllables, 3 some- 
times five, sometimes four long ones, which he forces into a single anapest. 

J. M. P. Smith, "The Structure of Obadiah," The American Journal 
of Semitic Languages and Literatures (January, 1906), pp. 131-38, while 
agreeing with Wellhausen, Nowack, and Marti on most points, makes a 
new departure by athetizing vss. 12-14. In the meantime the unity of 
Obadiah has had its defenders. Hitzig refers "the captives of this fortress " 
to the Jews carried away into Egypt and settled there in fortresses by 
Ptolemy Lagi, 312 b. c. (Josephus, Arch., XII, 1,1; contra Apion, II, 4). 
In the "report" of vs. 1 he sees an allusion to the command for an expedi- 
tion against Petra, which was given by Antigonus immediately after Ptolemy 

*rra dti 

aDrroma-na , ClOn rrai, "IE? mil and THE mPP are good illustra- 
tions from vss. 17 and 18. 



6 INTRODUCTION TO STUDY OF OBADIAH 

had wasted the Palestinian coast. Hitzig supposes that the author of 
Obadiah was one of the captives and that he wrote his prophecy in a castle 
in Egypt. He was the first scholar to assign so late a date for the entire 
prophecy, making no distinction between early and late. Nowack brings a 
valid objection against Hitzig' s view from the fact that at that time the 
Edomites were no longer in possession of Petra. 

Caspari, Delitzsch, Keil, Orelli, Kirkpatrick, Peters, and others con- 
sider the whole of Obadiah pre-exilic in its origin. The most of those 
who take this position see the occasion for the prophecy in the capture 
and plundering of Jerusalem by the Philistines and Arabians under 
Jehoram, recorded in II Chron. 2i:i6f. But this supposition renders 
impossible a satisfactory explanation of vss. 11-14, which are almost 
universally recognized as referring to the sacking of Jerusalem by the 
Chaldaeans aided by the Edomites. Few of Peters' twenty-five or thirty 
parallels to prove the unity of authorship are of any value; for they are, 
almost without exception, within sections which no one had ever thought 
of dividing, or of such a character that they might be matched in any 
passage of equal length. The historical method has made this view 
untenable. The historical ; method of interpretation which proceeds 
upon the supposition that the prophet's sermon always contains a 
message for his own day necessitates the division of the book into at 
least two parts. 

Although we can accept the view of Wellhausen, Nowack, and Marti 
that the main division comes in vs. 15, still we cannot follow them in mak- 
ing vss. 1-7 a record of past events, or even of things just transpiring, and 
at the same time consider vss. 1-14, 156 with the exception of 6 and 7^-9 
a unit. For the Edomites, suffering the disasters recorded in vss. 1-7, 
would hardly be in a state of mind or in position to commit the crimes 
against which they are warned in vss. 12-14. Again, the penalty is still 
in the future (vs. 15): "as you have done, so shall it be done to you." 
Nothing is gained by regarding with Marti the imperfects of this verse 
as presents: "Your deed is returning upon your own head;" for we are 
immediately confronted with the prohibitions in vss. 12-14. This brings 
us to a difficulty in the way of making vs. 11 and vss. 12-14 parts of the 
same piece; for in the latter the prophet is looking to the future, and the 
tenses of the former make it equally certain that the events described in 
that verse are in the past. The statements of vs. 11 make known the part 
which the Edomites took with the Babylonians against the Jews when the 
city of Jerusalem was captured. The prohibitions in the three following 
verses are directed against what the Edomites were doing, or were about 



INTRODUCTION TO STUDY OF OBADIAH 7 

to do when the prophet appeared, who here makes an earnest protest 
against their conduct. 

It will not do, in defiance of the laws of the language, to render "You 
should not have looked .... should not have entered," etc., as is done 
by Mercer, Grotius, Ewald, Winckler, and others, an interpretation which 
has found its way into Koenig's Syntax, 190&, where he says, "The &OD b^ 
of Obad., vss. 12-14 in a context of the past with 'and' would mean 'And 

you ought not to have '" This is in substantial agreement with 

Rashi and Kimchi, who render "It was not for you to look," and with 
Aben Ezra's "It was not fitting that you look." But all these propositions 
are to be rejected, because no one of their advocates is able to produce a 
single example of such usage, Koenig's rule being based upon this passage 
alone. 

Others feeling the grammatical difficulty in the way of the above render- 
ings have various devices for saving these verses for the past. Hitzig, 
Nowack, G. A. Smith, Marti, and some others have supposed that the 
prophet, in vivid realization of Edom's crime, has projected himself into 
the scenes of the past, and is speaking from an imaginary standpoint, pro- 
hibiting what has already been done — a thing of which there is not a hint 
in the text. Johannes thinks that the warning is sarcastic. But all this 
seems to be a makeshift unsupported by anything found elsewhere in the 
prophets, to avoid an apparent difficulty, and so is no less objectionable 
than the position of those who put the prophet before the capture of Jerusa- 
lem by the Babylonians, and have him predict not only the punishment 
of Edom, but also the crimes for which he suffers it. Both alike abandon 
the historical method of interpretation, and upon a priori grounds inject 
into the language of the prophet an unnatural, not to say impossible, mean- 
ing. bfcS with the imperfect must refer to the future. If vs. 7 is a record 
of history, past or in the making, vss. 12-14 cannot be a continuation of 
vss. 1-11; for in that case the Edomites would be warned against doing 
that which for them was impossible. If vss. 1-7 contain a prediction based 
upon a movement among the nations threatening the destruction of the 
Edomites, the prophet might upbraid them for their crimes and preach 
judgment in view of the impending calamity; but the time for warnings 
such as are found in vss. 1 2-14 would then be past. For syntactical reasons 
we cannot consider vss. 1-11 and 12-14 parts of the same poem. Further- 
more, vss. i-ii are composed in the trimeter movement, while vss. 12-14 
are in the qinah-meter. J. M. P. Smith is right in athetizing vss. 12-14; 
for they are from a different author, or at least written on a different occasion 
from that of vss. 1-11. 



8 INTRODUCTION TO STUDY OF OBADIAH 

Vss. 12-14 form an independent section, but they have received some 
additions since leaving the pen of their author. Vs. 14a 1 in the position 
which it occupies in the MM is peculiar in that it departs from all the 
other qinah-verses of the series in which it is found; for the second member 
of each consists of "in the day of," followed by a genitive expressing mis- 
fortune or disaster, which in the line under consideration is missing. Again, 
the order of the thought presents a serious difficulty, because in 14a "his 
escaped ones" have been "cut off," while in 14& the Edomites are exhorted 
not to "deliver up his survivors." There can be little doubt that originally 
the line immediately followed vs. 11, and that after the displacement was 
made bl$ was inserted between the *| and the verb, that the beginning 
might conform to that of the other lines of the series. If it is restored to 
this place, the sequence of thought is all that could be desired. 

It is evident that 136 is a variant of 12a, a conclusion which I had 
reached and recorded in manuscript before I read J. M. P. Smith's "Struc- 
ture of Obadiah;" but it is unnecessary to make the sweeping changes 
proposed in these verses by Winckler, Wellhausen, Nowack, and Marti, 
who regard the two as variants of one and the same verse. For if 136 2 is 
rejected as a dittography of 12a, and 14a is restored to its proper position 
at the end of vs. 11, what remains makes a good strophe of six lines in the 
qinah-meter. 

The causal clauses in vss. 15 and 16 are not easy to dispose of in the 
present arrangement of the text, as may be seen from the many efforts 
to give the passage an intelligible meaning. Drusius and Rosenmueller 
made the ^ of 15a refer back to the statement "cut off forever" at the 
end of vs. 10; Caspari supposed the *0 of 15a and that of 16a to be co-ordi- 
nate, and that these two verses give the reason for the warnings found in 
vss. 12-14; but Mercer would have 16a refer to 15a. But none of these 
treatments can be called satisfactory; for we have either: (1) a sudden 
change, without warning, from Edomites to Jews in the persons addressed 
(Aben Ezra, G. A. Smith, and others), or (2) we must understand "drink" 

1 It is interesting to note that Symmachus had ras <f>vyaSetas avrov (Field's 
Hexapla), i. e., "bands of fugitives," in the place of p^SH, so there is a bare possibility 
that the latter word arose from a dittography of TlD'OS which now appears after the 
infinitive, and that DT3 has dropped out. In that case we should restore the line 
as follows: irT"On DTD T'CbB b? TO^n btfl . But as all the other ancient ver- 
sions support the Hebrew text, this course has little in its favor, and the line is to be 
removed from its present position. The "fugitive bands" of Symmachus may have 
been an attempt on his part to translate p*lDH . 

2 In Xin 5S vs. 13b has preserved the correct reading; for the 1 is without 
meaning at the beginning of the section, and if we reject it, each tristich of the strophe 
will begin with the simple 5X . 



INTRODUCTION TO STUDY OF OBADIAH 9 

in 16a to refer to the reveling of the Edomites, and in 166 to the punish- 
ment which all nations suffer on the day of Yahweh (Rashi, Kimchi, 
Hitzig, Peters, and others), or (3) the perfect DITTY© in 1 6a must be ex- 
plained of the future punishment of the Edomites (Happach, Pusey, and 
others), all of which is forced and unnatural. To avoid the difficulty in 
(1), Winckler suggests the reading ItftiT .... Drr81Z3tt for DrPlYffi 
IHttT . . . . , translating " For as ye have destroyed my holy mountain, so 
shall all nations be destroyed." But this still leaves us without an expla- 
nation of the fact that, while hitherto Edom has appeared in the singular 
only, now for the first time the nation is addressed in the plural. More- 
over, the nations in vss. 1-14 are the agents under Yahweh for the 
destruction of Edom, but now in the day of the Lord they perish together 
with Edom in the judgment. Again, as Nowack points out, a contrast 
between Edomites reveling on Mount Zion and the heathen drinking 
the cup of Yahweh's wrath gives no intelligible meaning. Wellhausen, 
followed by Nowack, Marti, and J. M. P. Smith, proposes to put 15& 
before 15a and let it end the section, joining 15a with 16 ff. In that case 
we have at the beginning of a piece the second person plural without any 
vocative to indicate who are addressed. If it is assumed that it is the 
Jews, then the Jews are contrasted with all the nations, including Edom, 
who drink and perish utterly. Edom has become as if he had not been, 
while in marked contrast there is an escaped remnant in Mount Zion. 
After Edom has been completely annihilated in Yahweh's judgment upon 
the heathen in vs. 16, why introduce him in vs. 18 to be again consumed 
by Jacob? In this entire piece, aside from vs. 16, the interest is con- 
fined to Jacob's victory over Edom, and the regaining of his territory and 
dominion. This Verse is a disturbing element, having no vital con- 
nection with any other part of the prophecy. It is a later addition, and 
may have been suggested by Jer. 49:12; or 25:15-17. If we remove 
it from the text, transfer 17& to the beginning of vs. 19, as both form and 
subject-matter indicate, and eliminate a few explanatory glosses, the 
thought of the piece flows on without interruption from beginning to end. 
The same hand that inserted vs. 16 may have added "upon all nations" 
to 15a; for with this single exception, the prophet is interested in the 
destruction of Edom only. Furthermore, it overburdens the line which 
is a perfect trimeter without it. 

Beginning with vs. jd the viewpoint is entirely different from that of the 
preceding portion of the book. The third person takes the place of direct 
address. We have sometimes, it is true, a sudden change from the second 
person to the third, when the prophet under the influence of excitement 



IO INTRODUCTION TO STUDY OF OBADIAH 

gives utterance to an exclamation. But here, apparently without reason, 
such a change is sustained through six lines. How abrupt the transition 
from "They have driven thee to the border," etc., to "There is no under- 
standing in him! In that day, is the oracle of Yahweh, 'I will destroy 
wise men from Edom, and understanding from Mount Esau.'" Well- 
hausen and others who follow him are undoubtedly right in regarding vss. 
7 d-g as an interpolation. But we see no sufficient reason for regarding vs. 
6 as spurious. The arguments offered against it do not seem to us valid. 
There is little force to Marti's objection to its genuineness on the ground 
that in vs. 7 the disaster that overtakes Edom is not a plundering but a 
driving-out, inasmuch as he retains vs. 5, which forcibly calls the attention 
to stealing and plundering. Wellhausen, Nowack, and Marti condemn 
vs. 6 as a gloss, because of the use of the third person for Edom, although, 
both before and after, the nation is addressed. But in a case like this the 
change of person is too common to excite wonder. A good example is 
found in Isa. 1 :21a, in which the prophet injects the exclamation, "How has 
the faithful city become a harlot ! " into the middle of an address to Jerusa- 
lem. Even Marti himself (Kurzer Hand-Commentar) sees nothing irregular 
in this passage. For numerous other illustrations see Koenig's Stilistik, 
pp. 238 ff. So we retain the verse with Kuenen, G. A. Smith, Winckler, 
J. M. P. Smith, and others. 

We are now prepared to sum up the results of our investigation. We 
find that the Book of Obadiah, to say nothing of glosses, consists of three 
well-defined sections: (A) vss. 1-7C, 10, 11, 14a, 156; (B) vss. 12, 130c, 
146; (C) vss. 15a (156), 17a, 18, 17&, 19-21; and two interpolations: 
(X) vss. 7^-9; (Y) vs. 16. They all have Edom as their object and this 
fact is their common bond of union. The vision of Obadiah, as we have 
it in the iU©, is not a unit, but a collection of oracles against this unnatural 
brother of Judah. The basis of the book is section A. Some collector of 
the oracles of Obadiah has inserted B between vss. 11 and 14, entering 
it as a protest against the conduct of Edom described in the former verse, 
and in a subsequent copying 14a and 146 exchanged places. For such 
transposition see vs. 5 compared with Jer. 49:9. The author of C using 
A and B as the foundation of his own message, begins his poem immediately 
after the protest of vss. 12-14, with verse 15a, "For the day of Yahweh is 
near," and saves 15& as a part of his own work. When or by whom X 
and Y were interpolated, it is impossible to say. Copying or recopying 
with the dittographies, glosses and displacements has resulted in the text 
of the Massorites. For further discussion of details, see textual criticism 
under the various sections, and the appended notes at the close. 



INTRODUCTION TO STUDY OF OBADIAH 



A. The Vision of Obadiah concerning Edom 

In fixing the date of this piece (vss. i-yc, 10, n, 14a, 15ft), our 
only source of information is the prophecy itself. A careful reading 
reveals the fact that behind the author is a capture of Jerusalem the 
details of which are still fresh in his memory, embittering him against 
the Edomites because they identified themselves with the enemy in 
plundering the city, and, stationing themselves at suitable points along 
the lines of flight, cut down the fleeing Jews as they were trying to make 
their escape. 

Four captures of Jerusalem are recorded in the Old Testament. The 
first of these by Shishak mentioned in I Kings 14: 25 f., no one brings into 
connection with our prophecy; for the Edomites remained in subjection 
to Judah and had nothing to do with it. As foreigners are the principal 
actors (Obad., vs. 11), the conquest under Amaziah, when Joash of Israel 
broke down four hundred cubits of the wall of Jerusalem and plundered 
the treasures of the temple and the palace, is excluded. Delitzsch, Keil, 
Orelli, Kirkpatrick, and others have thought of the statement in II Chron. 
21 :i6f. as furnishing the historical background for Obadiah. The deter- 
mining factor in this hypothesis is the supposition that the relation of 
Jer. 49:7-22 to Obadiah in which the more original form of the prophecy 
appears makes impossible the dating of our book later than the fourth 
year of Jehoiakim's reign (Jer. 46 : 1 f.), and so of necessity there can be no 
thought of the capture of Jerusalem under Nebuchadrezzar. But inas- 
much as it is now recognized that chaps. 46-49 of Jeremiah in their pres- 
ent form are very late (Stade, Schwally, Smend, Wellhausen, Nowack, 
and others), and since the proof -passage from Chronicles makes no 
mention of the Edomites, there is nothing to be said in favor of this 
position. 

The only sacking of the city that will satisfy all the conditions, and 
especially the part taken by the Edomites, is the one by the Babylonians 
under Nebuchadrezzar in the war that ended with the breaking-up of the 
nation and its captivity. Wellhausen, Nowack, Marti, and others think 
that this is the only situation into which our piece will fit. Marti says that 
the capture of Jerusalem by the Chaldaeans can be the only one meant. 
The conduct of Edom at that time called forth the bitter denunciations 
of other writers of the Old Testament (Ps. 137:7; Ezek., chaps. 35 and 36; 
Lam. 4:22). 

Another factor entering the problem is the impending humbling of the 
proud Edomites who rely upon their impregnable stronghold. At the 



12 INTRODUCTION TO STUDY OF OBADIAH 

call of Yahweh's messenger the nations are already rising, and Edom is to 
be cut off forever because of violence done his brother nation, Judah. This, 
however, is denied by Wellhausen and Nowack who insist that we have in 
this section a record of past events and not a statement of something yet 
to be realized in the expectation of the prophet. In support of this view are 
offered the perfects in vss. 1-7 and the detailed statements in vs. 7. But a 
series of perfects describing future events is common enough in prophetic 
literature, and picturesque descriptions entering into details, such as are 
offered in vs. 7, are not without parallels in the imaginative language of the 
Old Testament prophets. The predictive element of Isa. 9:1-60 is not 
called into question, although the prophet with a single exception uses the 
perfect or its equivalent throughout. There seem to be insuperable diffi- 
culties in the way of this position of Wellhausen's; for both syntax and 
subject-matter are in opposition to it; so it is practically abandoned by 
Marti, who considers our piece a prophetic estimate of events just trans- 
piring when the prophet appears. The objections to this view are: (1) 
The natural explanation of the rising of the nations (vs. 1) is that they may 
in the future execute the decree of Yahweh. (2) The condition in vs. 4 
looks to the future and would have little or no meaning, if Edom had already 
been brought down. (3) Had the prophet been looking back upon the 
past conquest of Edom, we should expect in the apodosis of his contrary- 
to-fact conditions not the imperfect but the perfect. (4) This calamity 
overtakes the Edomites as a punishment because of their sin against a 
brother nation (vs. 10), and that penalty has not yet been visited, but is 
still in the future (vs. 15), "as you have done, it shall be done to you; your 
deed shall return upon your own head." 

History has very little information to give on the driving of the Edomites 
out of their land. In 312 b. c. their territory was in possession of the 
Nabataeans (Diodorus, XIX, 94), and had already become a desolation 
more than a century earlier, when the Book of Malachi was written; so 
Wellhausen, Nowack, Marti, and others put the prophecy in the first half 
of the fifth century b. c. This is done upon the assumption that the 
actual driving-out of the Edomites was the occasion of our prophecy and that 
this took place about the beginning of that century. So far as definite 
proof is concerned, there is none. But if we knew just when they were 
expelled from their country (unfortunately we know nothing about it), 
it would not necessarily fix the date of vss. 1-7. If Edom was ripe for 
judgment, our only question is: Was there a movement among the nations 
to give point to such a message ? It does not concern us to know whether 
the Edomites, when they were banished from their home-land, were driven 



INTRODUCTION TO STUDY OF OBADIAH 1 3 

out in just the manner here described or not. It is not necessary to suppose 
that such an attack ever took place in the time of our prophet. 

It is a recognized probability that the movement of the Scythians in the 
north called out Zephaniah with his message of judgment upon Jerusalem, 
although the expected punishment of Judah never came from that source. 
The same uprising of that wild people was the occasion of the earlier oracles 
of Jeremiah. While the predicted judgment of Yahweh upon the sinful 
nation did not fail, the agents in its execution, when it came, were not the 
Scythians, but the Babylonians, a generation after the time of the message. 
In Isa. 10:28-32 the prophet gives an imaginary and picturesque descrip- 
tion of the march of the Assyrian upon Jerusalem, entering into details. He 
expects him to make his way through the cities and passes of the north, one 
after the other, until he reaches Judah's capital. But when Sennacherib 
invaded the country, he came not over the course seen in the vision of the 
prophet, but from the southwest. To take one more example, that 
recorded in Isa., chap. 13, Yahweh marshals his hosts in the mountains, 
there is a slaughtering of men, plundering of houses, and dishonoring of 
women; for he has stirred up the Medes against Babylon for the purpose 
of making that proud city an everlasting desolation. As a matter of fact, 
Babylon passed into the hands of Cyrus without a struggle and remained 
intact. 

For the expulsion of the Edomites our sources leave open the period 
from 586 b. c. to the writing of Malachi around 450 b. c. without a hint as 
to when or how it was done. The numerous citations above from the 
prophets prove that in fixing the date of our piece we need not know when 
these enemies of the Jews were forced out of their territory. The prophet's 
vivid recollection of the scenes connected with the capture and destruction 
of Jerusalem favors a time very soon after that terrible calamity had over- 
taken him and his fellow-countrymen. So we have only to inquire whether 
soon after the fall of Jerusalem there was an uprising or commotion among 
the nations to furnish occasion for vss. 1-7. Josephus tells us (Ant., X, 9) 
that five years after the destruction of Judah's capital, Nebuchadrezzar 
invaded Coele-Syria and made war upon the Moabites and Ammonites. 
Ewald (History of Israel, Vol. IV, p. 277, English transl.) accepts the his- 
toricity of this statement and sees a confirmation of it in Jer. 52 : 30, and Ezek., 
chap. 21 (20:45 — 21 :32), and we may add that the part played by Baalis, 
king of the Ammonites, against Gedaliah was an act of war against Babylon 
which Nebuchadrezzar would not be likely to overlook. This rising of the 
Moabites and Ammonites would give the prophet an occasion for his 
message against the Edomites, and would make possible the treachery of 



14 INTRODUCTION TO STUDY OF OBADIAH 

their allies, the neighboring Arabs, seen in his vision. There is no reason 
for considering this section a historical sketch; for the prophet might 
well draw upon his imagination for every statement in it. It was no new 
thing in the Semitic world of that time for allies to prove false and disappoint 
the expectations of those who relied upon them. Edom in his invincible 
fortresses may not be overcome by force of arms; but treachery of allies 
professing friendship may entice him from his strongholds and cause his 
destruction. 

This section consists of five strophes, each containing six lines, with the 
exception of the last, which is made up of eight. Every strophe makes 
its special contribution to the thought of the poem. In strophe I, Yahweh, 
through his messenger, summons the nations against Edom, humbles 
him, and brings him into contempt. Strophe II gives a lively description 
of Edom filled with pride, relying upon his rocky fortress and bidding 
defiance to heaven itself, but brought low in spite of his inaccessible habi- 
tation. Strophe III pictures the fearful devastation wrought by the enemy 
while in strophe IV former friends and allies drive him from his land. 
Strophe V justifies the judgment of Yahweh by citing Edom's part in 
plundering Jerusalem, and in the slaying of her fugitives. The two closing 
lines call attention to the main thought, declaring that the coming disaster 
is a righteous retribution visited upon the Edomites who are to be paid in 
their own coin. 

mo ym 
rrrr nwa a wam rmom i i 

mrbzb wipi 

i TVTV *>D*1K TJ3X HD is a stereotyped expression often used in prophecy, but not 
suitable here, because what follows would have no meaning in the mouth of Yahweh. 
It is to be removed as secondary with Nowack, Marti, and others. 

2 The LXX reads with J er. 49:14 Tl^'Q'O instead of WQ1D , but the latter as 
the more difficult reading is to be retained. The prophet represents his people as 
hearing the report along with himself. 

3 In this and the following line Jeremiah has preserved the better reading; for, 
as J. M. P. Smith has pointed out, the one line of Obadiah is too long, is repetitious, 
and lacks the descriptive quality of Jeremiah. 

4 It is unnecessary to read TO$ with Wellhausen, Marti, and others, as the 
prophet may have had in mind the country of Edom, as in Jer. 49: 14. 



INTRODUCTION TO STUDY OF OBADIAH 1 5 

"man nna *in 

■pron "jib yti- 3 n 
ybo *ona "DDir 
mbn tan void -ana 
■pa *mr m 

3 -j5p 112335 rran ds 4 
rrtr taw •yrrnK mb 

4 -]b 1*0 tr&a Da 5& ni 

^b l iao D^ntt dk s<* 
d^ "oar aibn 

wwko 13DD 

^ribiu bin^n u 7 iv 
-pcxon ^mn ^tf bs 
-pbia "imk ^b ibir 
6h pnnn ttcs wid* 

1 Read D"IiO for "WJ2 , as in J er. 49:15, because of the parallel (Nowack, 
Selbie, Marti, J. M. P. Smith). 

2 Read with the Greek, Syriac, Vulgate, and Nowack D'H'E ; Marti who 
thinks that irQtt? D'HE is much better than the circumstantial 7TO3 D"Htt ''EJSfi 
of Jeremiah. Furthermore, "irQTE D^IIS makes a fine parallelism in thought to 

■pp rraan . 

3 D*! 1 © D^HDIID I'D DX which is not. found in the parallel passage of Jeremiah 
betrays its secondary character by leaving JTO^fi without an object (J. M. P. Smith). 

4 The text of Obadiah in vs. 5, with its additions, is inferior to that of Jer. 49:9, 
which enables us to set the verse in order. Omit Hl3 v "HTY© D&t as a gloss on D&t 
D'OW ; also nn^ttHD "pX which is out of place here (Wellhausen, Condamin, 
Cheyne, Nowack, Sievers, J. M. P. Smith), and transpose a and b (Sievers, 
J. M. P. Smith). 

s Wellhausen, followed by Nowack and Marti, omits vs. 6 from the text as a 
later addition, but the reasons are insufficient and the text may stand. See Intro- 
duction. 

6 Wellhausen and many others regard TDJlb which is not found in the Greek as a 
corrupt dittography of "JttblD . Omit with Wellhausen, Cheyne, Nowack, Marti, and 
others *Q HSinn "pJS , as meaningless in this place. 



1 6 INTRODUCTION TO STUDY OF OBADIAH 

'rwn -jcsn *pna ocma 10 

2 toe -pap on n v 

bnis it DbioiT b^i 
orra ina© nna d^ 

pnsn b? rapm i4« 
vtrbs na 3 rmDnb 
"jb nisr tra? imae 15& 
-pcaro aw -jb?jj 

The Vision of Obadiah concerning Edom 
I 
We have heard a report from Yahweh, 
For a messenger has been sent among the nations: 
"Gather yourselves together, and come against her, 
And rise up for the battle." 
Behold I have made you small among the nations. 
Despised are you among men. 

II 

The pride of your heart has deceived you, 

Dwelling in the retreats of the rock, 

Setting his habitation on high, saying in his heart, 

Who can bring me down to the ground ? 

Though you make your nest high like the eagle, 

From there will I bring you down, is the oracle of Yahweh. 

Ill 

If grape-gatherers came to you, 
Would they not leave gleanings ? 
If thieves came unto you, 

1 Vss. 8 and 9, including btSptt which the LXX joins with vs. 10, are regarded as 
an interpolation by Wellhausen, Nowack, G. A. Smith, Marti, and others, so vs. 7 is 
immediately followed by vs. 10. For the sake of the meter, drop with J. M. P. Smith 
ypy** which is an inserted comment on "pJlX . Remove from the text blSp'E as 
a gloss on OttlTQ (Nowack, Marti, J. M. P. Smith). 

2 We follow J. M. P. Smith in rejecting I^FI D^IT n"QlE D1*D as a prosaic 
marginal note, because it introduces the carrying away of the spoils before the entrance 
into the city and the division of the booty. 

3 For the position of vs. 14a immediately after vs. 11, see Introduction. 



INTRODUCTION TO STUDY OF OBADIAH 1 7 

Would they not steal what sufficed them ? 

How is Esau plundered ! 

His hidden treasures how searched out ! 

IV 

Even to the boundary have they sent you; 

All your allies have deceived you; 

Men at peace with you have prevailed over you, 

Placing under you a net. 

Because of violence done your brother shame shall cover you, 

And you shall be cut off forever. 

V 

In the day when you stood in opposition, 

And strangers entered his gate, 

And cast lots over Jerusalem, 

Even you were as one of them; 

And you stood at the crossway 

To cut off his fugitives. 

As you have done so shall it be done to you; 

Your dealing shall return upon your own head. 

B. The Prophet's Protest 
In section B (vss. 12, 13a, c, 146) are found echoes of events which we 
know from other Old Testament writers took place at the fall of Jerusalem 
and soon afterward. The Edomites who took part in the plundering of 
the city are still pressing into the territory of the Jews, taking possession of 
their property and cutting off the fugitives, or delivering them into the 
hands of their enemies. Although they had been allies of the Jews early 
in the war which broke up the kingdom of Judah (Jer. 27 13), the Edomites 
later made common cause with the enemy, taking vengeance (Ezek. 25 : 12) 
because they had once borne the yoke of Judah (II Kings 14:7, 22; 16:6). 
We may read their satisfaction over the downfall of their neighbors, their 
taunts and jeers, the eagerness with which they enter the land to take 
possession, and their deeds of violence, in Ezek. 36:5; 35:13, 10, 5. The 
"day" which receives so much emphasis in this little poem, recurring at 
the end of every line with a genitive synonymous of disaster, recalls Ps. 
137:7, in which the Psalmist fervently prays Yahweh to remember against 
the sons of Edom the day of Jerusalem; who said, "Rase it, rase it, even 
to the foundation thereof." Another parallel to our passage and from the 
same period is "the time of their calamity," in Ezek. 35 : 5. The neighbors 
of the Jews in the day of their disaster pressed into the country to enrich 
themselves with what was left of their goods (Stade, Geschichte, Vol. I, 
p. 694), and predatory bands of guerrillas would be doing the very things 



1 8 INTRODUCTION TO STUDY OF OBADIAH 

against which the prophet protests in vss. 12-14. So there is no period 
of Old Testament history into which this piece will fit so well as the years 
immediately after the capture of Jerusalem by the Chaldaeans. 

These verses written in the qinah-meter form a well-balanced strophe of 
two tristichs each containing a climax and ending with the refrain, "day of 
distress." In the first the prophet conceives of the Edomites' hostility mani- 
festing itself with ever-increasing intensity in three stages of development : 
(1) in looking upon the calamities of the brother nation with complacency 
and satisfaction; (2) in exulting over the children of Judah in their down- 
fall; and (3) in giving outward expression to their feelings in words of scorn 
and derision. In the second the thought passes on to the violence done 
the property and person of the Jews. 

2 ra DV3 II -pan 'aon bis 12 
dtm* dyo II trrrr *ttab mm bai 
ms Dm ll ^a bran ban 
dt» dvi II '•n? "van tflnn b» 13 
*itk DvalhbTa »t nbran bai 
ms Dm II mo ijcn b»i 14& 

1 In 12a the DI^Q of T*"*^ CPS is a dittography (Winckler, Nowack, Marti, 
J. M. P. Smith). 

2 A discussion of some of the important changes in the UK® of vss. 12-14 is to be 
found in the Introduction. 

3 Read T TOWT) with the Targum, Newcome, Henderson, Nowack, Marti, and 
others. Koenig (Lehrgebdude, Vol. I, pp. 285 f.), after a thorough discussion of the 
form, quotes with approval Olshausen, who says that the existing consonants were 
written by mistake for "P Jib 1 ©!") . This appears to be the simplest and the best solu- 
tion of the difficulty, although there is something to be said for the position of those 
who see in this form a variant of £3 "lb 1 ©*") and suppose that nblD is used as in 
II Sam. 6:6; 22: 17 ( = Ps. 18:17); so Peters, Buhl-Gesenius, J. M. P. Smith. 

4 In 13c there is insufficient reason for changing VP8 into 0*138 with Winckler, 
Nowack, and J. M. P. Smith, or into 1*138 with Marti, although the Greek does have 
dirwXd as clvtQv ; for dirwXcta is a favorite rendering with the LXX for the Hebrew 
"P8 , and change in number of a pronominal suffix is common where the name of a 
person represents a nation. T^8 is found twenty-four times in the JH®. In three 
cases at least the LXX evidently had another reading before them. Nine times they 
have dirwXeia as a translation (Deut. 32:35; Jer. 18:17; 46:21; Obad., vs. 13; Job 
21:30; 30:12; 31:3; Pro v. 1:26; 6:15), twice /cara(TTpo07j (Job 21:17; Prov. 1:27), 
and the remaining ten passages a different word in each case, all, however, containing 
the idea of "calamity," "disaster," "distress," or "defeat." It is true that they 
translate the end of both 12a and 13& by aTruXdas avrCov, but the Vulgate has perditionis 
eorum in the former, and vastitationis illius in the latter, so the text may stand. 



INTRODUCTION TO STUDY OF OBADIAH 1 9 

A Vigorous Protest against Edom's Treatment of the Jews in 
the Day of Distress 

Gloat not over your brother in the day of his adversity, 

And rejoice not over the sons of Judah in the day of their destruction, 

Nor utter proud words in the day of distress. 

Enter not the gate of my people in the day of their calamity, 

And lay no hand upon their wealth in the day of their calamity, 

Nor deliver up their survivors in the day of distress. 

C. Israel Conquers His Hereditary Foes, the Edomites, and 
Regains His Former Glory 

From the hints given in vss. 15a, 17-21 the date of this oracle may be 
fixed with a considerable degree of certainty. When after the fall of 
Jerusalem could the prophet with such a message have carried his hearers 
with him? He is not looking for deliverance from without; but the people 
are righting their own battles. He expects the people of God themselves 
will conquer their foes. His tone is very different from that of the Great 
Prophet of the Exile who hopes for salvation through Cyrus, "the anointed 
of Yahweh," whom he has raised up: "He shall build my city, and he 
shall let my exiles go free." 

Soon after the return from the captivity, when the Jews are a poor people 
few in numbers, Haggai (2:6, 22) comes out with the promise that Yahweh 
will shake heaven and earth, overturn the throne of kingdoms, overthrow 
chariots and those who ride in them; and the horses and their riders shall 
come down, every one by the sword of his brother. 

In chaps. 34 and 63 of Isaiah we have two apocalyptic pictures of 
judgment upon Edom. In the one, Yahweh's sword drunk with wrath 
comes down from heaven, slaughters the Edomites, and makes their land 
an everlasting desolation. In the other, Yahweh, with the day of vengeance 
in his heart, treads the winepress alone — there is no man with him, none 
to help — he tramples the people in his anger, and pours out their life-blood 
upon the earth. 

In the vision of Joel 4:9-13 (3-9-13), the nations are exhorted to 
prepare for war and come to the valley of Jehoshaphat, where Yahweh will 
enter into judgment with them. He gives his heavenly servants orders to 
put in the sickle; for the harvest is ripe and their wickedness is great. 
The Jews themselves take no part in the struggle. 

The apocalyptic section of Isa., chaps. 24-27, pictures a general judgment 
upon the world, in which there is a complete dissolution of the present 
order of things. The people of God are to escape by hiding until Yahweh 



20 INTRODUCTION TO STUDY OF OBADIAH 

visits upon the inhabitants of the earth punishment for their iniquity. 
Here Israel has nothing to do with his own deliverance. 

In Zech., chaps. 9-14, about 280 b. c, the situation is nearly the same. 
Yahweh appears in battle above the sons of Zion and his arrows go forth 
like lightning in defense of them. He sends a plague upon all the nations 
that war against Jerusalem. 

While there is not exact uniformity of view as to the date of all these 
pieces, it is recognized that they reflect the hopes and expectations of the 
Jewish people from the time of the captivity down to the early part of the 
Greek period of Old Testament history. In all of them relief comes from 
the raising-up of some hero outside the nation, or from revolution in the 
world-powers, or from the miraculous intervention of Yahweh in the 
affairs of men. For the first time after the Babylonians had broken up the 
nation, has a prophet represented the people as fighting their own battles 
and gaining their own victories. No place within four hundred years after 
the beginning of the Babylonian captivity can be found in which these con- 
ditions are satisfied. This brings us to the Maccabean age. 

The most suitable background for our prophecy is the victory of Judas 
over Lysias in the fall of 165 b. c, when the latter came up from the south 
by the way of Idumea and suffered a crushing defeat at the hands of the 
Jewish general (Schuerer, I, i, p. 216). There can be no doubt that the 
Edomites, the relentless enemies of the Jews, took part in this war; for we 
find Judas soon after making an expedition against them. The repeated 
victories of Judas would prepare the people as well as the prophet for 
just such a message and give it peculiar force at that time; for these tri- 
umphs would lead them to expect the dawning of the day of Yahweh when 
all their enemies were to perish. The prophet, looking back upon the 
terrible persecution and slaughter under Antiochus Epiphanes five years 
before, which united in suffering the people of his own generation with their 
ancestors in the siege of Jerusalem and its capture by the Babylonians, 
would expect, in view of the present victories, a speedy fulfilment of the 
old oracle and make it the starting-point for his own words of comfort. 
By this time the apostate Jews would be in hiding, or be silenced. That is 
reason enough for their receiving no attention in this brief oracle. 

This piece possesses no great literary merit. It lacks the animation of 
A, and the regular artistic form in which the lines of B appear is missing. 
The metrical scheme is irregular with lines varying from trimeter to tetram- 
eter. It may, however, including vs. i$bc which has been incorporated 
from the older poem, be divided into two well-defined strophes of ten lines 
each. In strophe I Israel brings utter destruction upon his old-time enemy, 



INTRODUCTION TO STUDY OF OBADIAH 21 

Edom; in strophe II he gets possession of his former territory. The day 
of Yahweh is at hand, bringing just retribution upon the Edomites for 
their sin; for God's people of both kingdoms united, like flame devouring 
the stubble, make a complete end of their enemies, so that no survivor 
is left. After this triumph over their foes, with possessions regained, 
they ascend Mount Zion, now the seat of the united kingdom's capital, to 
rule over the territory once held by Edom, and Yahweh is king over all. 
At the beginning of each strophe the general statement is made, while 
what follows gives the details. The text has suffered in transmission, 
now containing many explanatory glosses, and is hopelessly corrupt. No 
one knows what is meant by "this army," or "this fortress;" 1 and what 
or where Sepharad 2 is, every scholar is free to guess, and has been since 
the time of the Septuagint translation, which has in its place Ephratha. 

[-pans mizr ^bM 

4 ntrbs rmn frs iroi 17* 

iijtf npr m rrm 18 

mrb tpr rrm 

iDpb 11233? rrm 

Dib^i dj-q IpbTl 

11233? rrnb titd rrrr abi 

w mrr ^ 

Dn^irm^ rw npr rrn toti 17& n 
s nbai23n n»i nrti na iibti 19 

1 Hebrew, HTH bnH . 2 "nSO . 

3 D^l^n bD by makes the verse too long and may be from the hand tha": added 
vs. 16. 

4 Marti and J. M. P. Smith reject ttHp HTll for grammatical reasons; cf. 
Winckler. It may have been added from Joel 4:17; so Marti. 

s 1T2J37 in ni$ and D^tTlDbfi Fltf are with Nowack and Marti to be removed 
as explanatory glosses. Negeb and Shephelah cannot be subjects of the verb, so 
ywy in fitf and D^fltDbS nX , each with the sign of the accusative, are seen to be 
explanations of the preceding words. The Negeb was in possession of the Edomites 
thus belonging to Mount Esau, and Hebron was an Idumean center at the time of 
the Maccabean struggles, I Mac. 4:29, 61; 5:65, and long before, cf. Ezek. 
35:10-15; 36:5. The Philistines held the Shephelah, see Zech. 9:6; and the 
Maccabean wars (Stade, Geschichte, Vol. II, pp. 368 ff.). 



22 INTRODUCTION TO STUDY OF OBADIAH 

banis* *:nb rrm bm nbai 20 
nans i* ftfd "pa itdt* 
teds "Ti23» Dbwir rial 
aaan -n? n« wr 

fr* TO 4 DWO ibn 21 

TOib^n mrrb nrvrn 

C. Israel's Victory over His Foes and Restoration to His Land 

I 

For near is the day of Yahweh. 

(As you have done, so shall it be done to you; 

Your dealing shall return upon your own head.) 

And in Mount Zion there shall be an escaped remnant, 

And the house of Jacob shall become a fire, 

And the house of Joseph a flame, 

And the house of Esau stubble, 

And they shall burn among them and consume them, 

So that there will be no survivor to the house of Esau. 

For Yahweh hath spoken it. 

II 
And the house of Jacob shall regain their possessions; 
For they shall possess the South Land and the Shephelah 
And the field of Ephraim and Gilead: 
And the captive Israelites of this army 
Shall possess the land of Canaan unto Zarephath, 
And the captives of Jerusalem which are in Sepharad 
Shall possess the cities of the South Land. 
And they shall ascend Mount Zion with salvation 
To judge Mount Esau; 
And the kingdom shall be Yahweh's. 

1 TO"P1 is a dittography from the line above, to be rejected for the sake of the meter. 

a Since 'pI'Q'© is already included in Ephraim, and "pTG^Sn apart from fPH 
ypy* and DOT 1 D" 1 ! has no separate existence, "pE^m "pTQlD iTTB PlSI must 
be considered as no part of the original text; see Marti, who has followed Nowack. 

3 Restore "ITD^T which has dropped out because of its likeness to the following 
ntttf . Read "p« for TOK after the LXX (Oort; Kittel's Hebrew Bible). As the 
plural of the gentilic noun "C^DD is used elsewhere only once (Neh. 9 : 24) and then with 
the article, in apposition with "the inhabitants of the land," it is better to read "j^SD 
after Gen. 44:8; 46:31; 47:1,4,13,14,15; 50:5, and many other passages. 

4 With the ancient Greek versions and the Syriac, read DVB13 for DVCTQ . 
After the Jews have destroyed their enemies, they have no need of "saviors;" but 
"saved," that is as "victors," they ascend Mount Zion; cf. Zech. 9:6; Ps. ^^: 16. 



INTRODUCTION TO STUDY OF OBADIAH 23 

X. Verses 7J-9 

x Cn nmn -po id 

mm dm avin orn 2 8 
dtk«3 crmn rrrna 2 

■prn *my nnm 9 
iw *ra id"» rvir pab 

(There is no understanding in him.) 

In that day, it is the oracle of Yahweh, 

I will destroy wise men from Edom 

And understanding from Mount Esau; 

And the mighty men of Teman shall be dismayed, 

That every one may be cut off from Mount Esau. 

Y 

^imp nn b? nwrw nir^s *d 16 
ran tnan bs mur 
Yti Kite wi vbav imsi 

For as ye have drunk upon my holy mountain, 

All nations shall drink continually; 

They shall drink and perish and be as if they had not been. 

1 yd, 12 nSintl "pfc$ has every appearance of being a marginal comment upon the 
character of Edom, because through lack of discernment he trusted as friends and allies 
the enemies who have brought upon him sudden and unexpected ruin. 

2 The LXX notices neither the interrogative negative XlvH , which may have 
come from vs. 5, nor the 1 consecutive, translating the verb as a simple future. 7T1 at 
the beginning of "TniKni is a dittography of the last two letters of Hin^ . For the 
form SfPiK compare Jer. 46:8. This reading of the LXX is much simpler than that 
of ffiJS and in every way preferable. 

3 Read "Hinjl for "pTDJi with Kittel's Bible, and Marti who considers the ad- 
dress to the Edomite country Teman thrown in between vss. 8 and 96 as altogether out of 
place. 

* For the reading l^b^l see appended note on vs. 16. 



APPENDED NOTES 

Vs. 7: "VTO is a troublesome word for which the ancient versions give various 
renderings. The BDB Lexicon derives it from the root *)T)J and offers "net" 
as a probable meaning. Winckler proposes to read "ll^J for "fiTE and for the 
verb of the i$© 1}$12r rendering "take from thee thy nourishment." He derives 
the noun from the root T2£ , Hithp., which means according to BDB Lexicon 
"supply self with provisions," Jos. 9:4 and 12. But if such noun exists, it is 
found here only, and there is some question about the use of the root in biblical 
Hebrew. Furthermore, after the proposed changes have been made, can the 
words have the meaning which he puts upon them ? Marti objects to the transla- 
tion "snare" as affording no suitable meaning here. He continues: "They lay 
snares under you; but Edom has already been driven over the boundary." He 
proposes to read *fi}7J , or, since it is not certain that 1"1ji7J has the meaning 
"dwelling," better ^T112 , which occurs in biblical Aramaic (Dan. 4: 22, 29; 5:21), 
for the "fiT}2 of the ^®- He understands the clause to mean "they set up a 
habitation," or "settle in thy place," and adds the comment that the Arabs after 
driving out the Edomites settle in the land. But this clause with its verb T^TU* 1 
in the imperfect does not necessarily state what transpires after the events described 
in the preceding clauses of the verse, but may give attendant circumstances. 
See Marti's comment on Isa. 42 : 14 (Kurzer Hand-Commentar) and Driver's 
Hebrew Tenses, § 163. It is not probable that the Aramaic *\yTi2 was the original 
reading; for apart from the late gloss btSpft the prophecy is entirely free from 
Aramaisms. J. A. Selbie suggests that the "snare" of the versions may be due 
to a reading *fi2£10 > that is, "siege." For other translations and proposed emenda- 
tions see BDB Lexicon. While not entirely satisfactory, nothing better than 
"net" has been proposed. 

Vs. 12: i"03 #7ra£ \ey6fi€vop equals 1^3 in Job 3 1 : 3, from a root furnishing 
words in the other Semitic languages with a number of different meanings: in 
Assyrian, "rebel," "enemy;" Arabic, "evil," "change;" Sabean, "reject," 
"injure;" Syriac, "reject;" Targum, "strange," "foreign" (BDB Lexicon). 
As a result there are several interpretations for the passage. Rashi understands 
"his day" to be the day when he is delivered into the hands of his "enemies." 
With Aben Ezra it is the day "strange" in his eyes. Some think of the "estrange- 
ment" of the people from their land by driving them out of it (Kimchi, Mercer, 
Pusey); or of God's being "estranged" from his people and rejecting them 
(Tarnovius, Schnurrer, Henderson). The LXX, Syriac, Theodore of Mopsuestia, 
and Theodoret translate "day of foreigners" (perhaps reading D" ,I "GD), which 
according to Rosenmueller means when "foreigners invade the territory of the 
Israelites." But most scholars of today because of the parallelism have rightly 
decided for the meaning "misfortune," "calamity." Winckler proposes the 

24 



INTRODUCTION TO STUDY OF OBADIAH 25 

Niph'al infinitive construct IfHlDD , citing the parallel infinitive DIH^ at the 
end of vs. 12b in support of his reading. J. M. P. Smith follows Winckler because 
1150 is #""<*£ XeySfievov and the LXX renders the last word of the variant line 
(vs. 136) by 6\idpov airQv and this is the only occurrence in the Old Testa- 
ment of 6\edpos as an equivalent of "pfc$ , which now stands in the HSM of vs. 13&; 
but 6\o6petw is the rendering for THD in Judg. 6:25, 28, 30 and Num. 4:18. 
Hence the LXX's rendering of ITjfc in vs. 13& and the 115D of vs. 12a point to 
the Niph'al infinitive 1fV03 as the original reading. 

But it may be said in reply that the Niph'al infinitive construct of TH'D with 
suffix is not 1FH53 , but in*0»"l which does not resemble 1*03 quite so much 
as the form proposed; and, while airtiXeia which occurs nine times is the LXX's 
favorite rendering for TfcS , they have no fewer than eight other translations, all, 
however, containing the idea "destruction" or "disaster," for this same word, 
although it is found only twenty-four times in MW; so it is not strange that 
they should in rendering a passage like this, for the sake of variation, add one 
more synonym 8Xedpos to their list. There does not seem to be sufficient reason 
for setting aside 1"03 of vs. 12a in favor of 11*1*0X1 ■ 1*155 > though rare, need 
give no serious trouble; for words from the same root are common enough in 
the Hebrew Bible. Even if their meaning is limited to "foreign," which seems 
to suit neither our passage nor Job 31 : 3, it is but a step from "foreign," "strange" 
to "adverse," "adversity" or "hostile," "hostility." Compare the Greek 
aXXdrpeios, "strange," "hostile;" the Latin hostis, "stranger," "enemy;" 
alienus, "foreign," "adverse," "hostile," "perilous." "Calamity," the defini- 
tion given by BDB, comes naturally from the root meaning "strange," and 
makes excellent sense both in Obad., vs. 12, and in Job 31:3. 

Vs. 14: p*13 is found elsewhere only in Nahum 3 : 1, where it has the meaning 
"plunder "which is not suitable here. Although Kimchi in his commentary 
defines it "mother of ways," i. e., "crossroads," and in the Book of Roots "heads 
of ways," in the latter he seems to favor a different interpretation; for he explains 
by ^QlD ? i- e., "breaking," "slaughter," and compares Lev. 19: 16, "Thou shalt 
not stand against the blood of thy neighbor." The LXX and the Vulgate were 
evidently thinking of places of escape, the former having 5ie/c/3o\<£s, i. e., "pas- 
sages out," "exits" (Sophocles, Greek Lexicon sub voce; cf. Diodorus XVII, 68, 
and Ezek. 48:30), and the latter exitibus: they have been followed by Winckler. 
The thought of the Syriac seems to have been "a place of refuge;" for its trans- 
lation is l&nnV) which Brockelmann defines by cuniculus, that is "burrow," and 
in agreement with this is Happach's "caves." Henderson sees in the word under 
consideration a "pass" through the mountains, while Johannes takes it in a 
collective sense with the meaning "those who break through," "escape." y*ij" , 
the conjecture of Graetz, is no improvement on MM. All of these are to be 
rejected for "parting of the ways," "crossroads," which has been accepted by 
the vast majority of scholars and which comes naturally from the meaning of 
the root p"l£| "tear apart, away." 

Vs. 16: I3?bl- For the verbal forms in Obad., vs. 16; Job 6:3; Prov. 



26 INTRODUCTION TO STUDY OF OBADIAH 

20 : 25, as well as for the noun 3>b (" throat"), Prov. 23 : 2, the BDB Lexicon posits 
two roots spelled alike (3?*]b or 3?3?b)> but with different meanings: (1) "swallow," 
"swallow down;" (2) "talk wildly;" but Koenig maintains that a single root 
is sufficient for all these forms; see Lehrgebdude, §34, 7, b. Wellhausen, 
Nowack, G. A. Smith, Marti, and J. M. P. Smith, in view of such passages as 
Isa. 24:20; 29:9; Ps. 107:27, read *]$y\ instead of *13?bl • This verb then 
states the result of the drinking. They shall "stagger" or "reel" and come to 
naught. Gressmann, Der Ursprung der Israelitisch-Juedischen Eschatologie, 

p. 132, reads ibjl , transposing the letters, and compares the Arabic JlC . His 
translation of 16& runs: werden alle Voelker bestaendig trinken, trinken und ivieder 
trinken, und sein, als waeren sie nie gewesen. See Lane's Arabic Lexicon sub 
voce: "drink again after drinking, uninterruptedly." This gives a good meaning 
without making any radical change in the M®, but does not account for the 
ancient versions. In place of the word under consideration the LXX r have 
"they shall go down;" the Vulgate 2 and Arabic 3 both render "shall swallow 
down;" the Syriac 4 uses two verbs to translate this one, "shall wonder and be 
excited," while the Targum 5 has "shall be destroyed." All these versions point 
to the reading *#bll1 • The translators of the Vulgate and the Arabic pointed 
the verb as a Qal or Piel, and the other three versions came from reading it as a 
Pual. For the LXX compare Karafialvw, used absolutely and pregnantly for 
"going down to Hades" in Isa. 5:14; Ezek. 32:21, 30, and Karapdaiov, "a way 
down," especially to the nether world (Liddell and Scott's Greek Lexicon sub 
voce), Hermes, the god who led souls down to the nether world, was called 
by the Rhodians and Athenians xarai/Sdr^s, poetic for KaTap&TTjs (Scholiast 
on The Peace of Aristophanes, 1. 650). 3?b3 with its various meanings, "swallow 
down," "confound," "destroy," furnishes sufficient explanation for the render- 
ings of all these ancient versions. So it is not improbable that the reading of 
Ut® arose from the dropping by some copyist of ^ from I3?b^l • 

For a very ingenious and at the same time exceedingly improbable solution 
of some of the problems connected with this verse see Critical Notes by Julius 
A. Bewer in Old Testament and Semitic Studies in Memory of William Rainey 
Harper, Vol. II, pp. 207-10. To account for the two Hebrew readings, *TOtl 
and n h 3D ? and the Greek ohop, he thinks that originally the text at the end of 
the first half of the verse ran: " 1 "" , 7JCDri5<D' , 13n ; that a copyist accidentally 

D 

omitted C^frM and afterward wrote it in thus: TWD^jH or ^T^rCWl- 


Then he was followed by two others, one of whom ignored the letters out of line 

1 Kal Ka.Tafi"f)<TovTai. 

2 et absorbebunt. 4 asj-^AJ© .o?©AJo . 

3 ^yZf*.) . 5 ■pttJbncn . 



INTRODUCTION TO STUDY OF OBADIAH 27 

and the * at the end; the other dropped "'T/jn reading the letters up, or down 
as the case may be, and mistaking ^ for H , with &O0 as a result. Finally this 
last copyist's work fell into the hands of one who read 2 n Z0 for fcOD • I n addition 
to all the other improbabilities we must suppose according to this theory that the 
copyist responsible for the first change in the text conveniently left space sufficient 
for the insertion of a letter at just the right point in the line, and that his lines were 
far enough apart for two letters between them, one above the other. Every 
position taken is assumption pure and simple; for he has cited no parallels, 
nor has he produced any other proof. The Greek ohov is easily explained by 
supposing the reading T2H for TEH 5 and n*O0 may be from the hand of some 
Hebrew who substituted it for T^Fl and as an interpretation of it. In 
harmony with this idea is Caspari's comment on "PHn , who thinks of all the 
nations drinking in turn one after the other until they perish. He says, " TED 
cannot be taken strictly; it can only mean a long time which ceases when all the 
nations have been destroyed." Hitzig's interpretation is, "Continually, so that 
the turn never comes from the nations to the Jews (Isa. 51:22 f.), as what 
immediately follows shows, even to their destruction." So the thought of the 
writer of 2*Q0 may have been that the nations drink all around so that none of 
them escape. 



LITERATURE 

Some of the more recent and important special works on Obadiah are: C. P. 
Caspari, Der Prophet Obadja ausgelegt, 1842; F. Delitzsch, Wann weissagte 
Obadja? (Rudelbach und Guericke, Zeitschrifl, 185 1, pp. 91 ff.); C. A. W. 
Sey del, Der Prophet Obadja, 1869; Peters, Die ProphetieObadjas, 1892; Winckler, 
Altorientalische Forschungen, Zweite Reihe, Band III (1900), pp. 425-57; A. 
Condamin, "L'unite d'Abdias," Revue biblique, Vol. IX (1900); J. A. Selbie, 
"Obadiah," in Hastings' Dictionary of the Bible; T. K. Cheyne, "Obadiah" in 
Encyclopaedia Biblica; J. M. P. Smith, "The Structure of Obadiah" in The 
American Journal of Semitic Languages and Literatures, Vol. XXII, No. 2, 
January, 1906; Sievers, "Alttestamentliche Miscellen," in Berichte ueber die 
Verhandlungen der Koeniglich-Saechsischen Gesellschajt der Wissenschaften zu 
Leipzig: Philologisch-historische Klasse, Band 29 (1907); and for the late date 
of the parallel passage in Jer., chap. 49, see Schwally, ZATW (1888), pp. 177 ff., 
and Schmidt, "Jeremiah" (Book) in Encyclopaedia Biblica. 

For Commentaries, Introductions, and other works of reference on the Twelve 
Minor Prophets see Harper's "Amos and Hosea" in The International Critical 
Commentary, where everything worth consulting, up to the time of its publication, 
may be found. 



VITA 

I, George A. Peckham, was born in Middlebury, now a part of Akron, 
Summit County, Ohio, July 17, 1851. I prepared for college in the Akron 
High School, in the Preparatory Department of Hiram College, and in 
Bethany College, and in the fall of 1872 entered Buchtel College, Akron, 
Ohio, graduating in the class of 1875 with the degree of A.B. For two 
years I was instructor in Greek, Latin, and Mathematics in my alma 
mater. In the fall of 1877 I was ordained to the ministry and served as 
pastor at Granger, Ohio, for one year, when I was elected to the professor- 
ship of Greek and Latin in Buchtel College. After holding this position 
for two years, I received a call to Hiram College, and since that time have 
held a professorship in the Ancient Language Department of this institution, 
at first the chair of Greek and Latin, later that of Biblical Languages, and 
since 1900 that of Old Testament Languages and Literature. 

At the suggestion of President Harper that I do some university work 
I entered the University of Chicago as a student in the summer of 1900, and 
for three full summer quarters pursued Semitic study, taking work under 
President W. R. Harper, Professors R. F. Harper, Ira M. Price, H. L. 
Willett, and John M. P. Smith, and I gratefully acknowledge my indebted- 
ness to them all. I feel that I owe much to President William R. Harper, 
a man of genuine piety, a thorough scholar, an inspiring teacher, and a 
commanding personality. I am especially indebted to Professor 'R. F. 
Harper for many hours of private instruction in Assyrian and incidentally 
in comparative grammar of the Semitic Languages. I am also under special 
obligation to Professor J. M. P. Smith who has furnished me with books 
and has been my counselor in the preparation of this thesis. He is in no 
way to be held responsible, however, for the positions here taken nor for the 
conclusions reached. 



29 



Deacidified using the Bookkeeper process. 
Neutralizing agent: Magnesium Oxide 
Treatment Date: June 2005 

PreservationTechnologies 

A WORLD LEADER IN PAPER PRESERVATION 

1 1 1 Thomson Park Drive 
Cranberry Township. PA 16066 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 

'llii III Wll in iwium i 





iMiiimi mi mill 

014 380 830 # 



